


Beam Me Up

by StormDancer



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack and Angst, M/M, OT5 Friendship, One Direction IN SPACE, Post-Zayn Canon, Ship Wars are Serious Business
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-19
Updated: 2015-05-19
Packaged: 2018-03-31 07:15:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3969143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StormDancer/pseuds/StormDancer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One Direction fans really are from everywhere...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beam Me Up

**Author's Note:**

> This was very much a weird venture for me, given that I haven't written Ziam for a while, I don't usually write canon, and I've never written crack. So I hope you enjoy! It should be canon compliant up until around mid-May, though it was written mainly in April, so later things were only vaguely worked in. Many thanks to my beta for encouraging me to go full-crack, to Hela, my Official Ziam Consultant who actually motivated me to start writing it, and to all the tumblr users who answered my questions about canon! 
> 
> Don't know, don't own, all that good stuff.

It’s a nice dream, Liam’s having. He’s on stage, and so are the boys, and they’re all singing Clouds, and then the stage blurs and he’s the only one singing, except Zayn is there too, leaning into him so Liam can smell him, can feel every inch of him. It’s a dream, so he can hold Zayn close like this without guilt at taking advantage of him or worrying he’s going to give something away; instead it just feels right, Zayn here with him, their voices rising together over a vast sea of people. Zayn’s smiling, his bright nose-scrunching grin, and he’s happy and Liam knows it, is sure of it. Zayn keeps grinning as he rests his head on Liam’s chest, so the ends of his hair tickles at Liam’s nose, and he wraps his arm around Zayn as he sings, because this is where everything’s supposed to be.

“’more minutes,” comes a grumble against his chest, one he’s not sure is part of the dream. Everything in Liam is heavy, like moving would be difficult, but he’s comfortable and cloudy like he’s slept for ages. He can still feel the warmth of a body pressed against him, a head on his chest so hair’s tickling his nose. “Don’t wanna.”

“Hm?” Liam hums.

“Sleep more.” Lips brush against his neck, and it’s just so comfortable, and Liam might still be dreaming, his head feels that foggy. “C’mon, Leeyum, sleep more.”

It’s the name that does it, that shoots his eyes open. No one says his name like that, not except for—there’s hair under his gaze, black and soft and Liam knows it even if not in this style, just like he knows the way breaths are falling against his neck and the way the body curves into his, fits perfectly against him.

“Zayn?” he breathes. He must still be dreaming. There’s no other way to explain it, because Zayn’s halfway across the world, and his brain’s still not working right. “What’re you doing here?”

“Hm?” Zayn lifts his head, and god, Liam had forgotten, somehow, just how heartbreakingly attractive he is, but it makes it more like a dream, the way Zayn smiles at him. “Liam?” He blinks again, his eyelashes dark against his cheeks, and Liam has to blink too. Zayn’s voice is sharper when he says it again, more awake. “Liam? What are you doing here?”

“I—” Liam’s trying to force his brain to work. Zayn’s not here. Zayn left. He didn’t get to sleep with Zayn like this, not anymore.

It’s that memory that makes him loosen his arms. Zayn shies away immediately, then curses as he falls off the—air mattress, what?—onto a hard floor.

“The fuck?” he swears. Liam knows the feeling. Now that Zayn’s farther away he can think again, and can take in the sleeping bag and air mattress and smooth sheets, and Zayn’s pajama pants and the ratty old vest that he always sleeps in. He doesn’t—“Liam, what the fuck, where are we?”

“Zayn?” That’s—Harry? For the first time, Liam looks around properly, and that’s almost even scarier. It’s the interior of a cabin or something, and he doesn’t know where they are but he’s certain it’s not the hotel he went to sleep in. At least he can see Harry blinking awake on the couch, brushing hair out of his face. And Liam’s in the sweatpants he went to sleep in, nothing’s changed there, which is more reassuring than it should be. “You’re here?”

“How drunk was I?” comes Niall’s groan from a bean bag next to Liam. “Can’t remember getting here.”

“Where is here?” Zayn demands, and his fingers are tight in the sheets, his eyes wide. Liam reaches out for him, to pull him into Liam so at least he’s there and will know Liam’s got him—but then he remembers, and falls back again. He doesn’t help, not really. Zayn’s gaze glances away from him, around the room. “Where the fuck is here?”

“Everyone shut up,” Louis says loudly, and Liam’s never been happier to hear his voice, coming from the other couch. “’s too loud.”

“Louis, wake up,” Liam orders. He needs Louis here. He needs all of them awake because he doesn’t know what the hell is happening or where they are. “Lou, this is a good trick, but where are we?”

“What do you mean?” Louis yawns, sits up, then jumps, visibly. “Where are we?”

“Could ask you that,” Liam demands.

“Good work getting us all here,” Niall agrees. “Did Alberto help?”

“And getting Zayn, that’s good too,” Harry adds. He sits up, the blankets falling away from his bare chest. “Hey, Zayn!” He reaches down, ending up sort of pawing at Zayn’s head in a way that has Zayn cracking a smile.

“Zayn? Why the fuck would I—” Louis’s gaze falls on Zayn, and Liam can see his whole body go tight. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

Zayn’s eyes narrow back. “Could ask you that. If this is a prank, if you fucking drugged me—”

“Right, because I care about you that much.”  

“And getting us from Kansas to Robin’s bungalow, that’s cool.” Niall cuts them off, with the ease of long habit. Right, that’s where Liam knows this place from. From those days at the very beginning. “How much money did you spend?”

“I’m telling you, I didn’t—”

“But—Robin redid the bungalow.” Harry glances around, chewing on his lip in confusion. “A few months after we were there. Did you recreate it?”

“Is this—” Liam steals a look at Zayn, then at Louis. He knows how hard Louis took Zayn leaving, how angry he’d been—how angry he still is. It’d been good, in a way; he’d raged so Liam didn’t have to. So Liam could Not Think About It, which meant he only thought about it every time he turned to sing Little Things and Zayn wasn’t there, or every time he saw something Zayn would like and he couldn’t tell him. He could have texted it, he supposes, but he didn’t want to intrude on Zayn’s solitude. Didn’t want to break things more. “Louis, are you—”

“It wasn’t me!” Louis repeats, louder, “I swear, I didn’t—”

“Fucking hell!” Harry yelps, and Liam turns to him, then follows his gaze behind him, where—

“Holy shit!” Niall swears. The door’s opened and the things that are coming through… “How much did you spend on special effects, Louis?”

“I swear to God, this isn’t me.” Louis’s voice is tight, and that’s what convinces Liam he’s telling the truth. The way he sounds legitimately scared. That, and the fact that the group of things coming in the door—there’s no way they’re special effects. Not like this.

They aren’t human. They aren’t anything Liam recognizes, maybe half a human’s height and they almost look human, but they aren’t, their arms too short and their torsos too long and the bodies not covered in a sort of robe-looking thing a smooth hairless silver that’s almost metallic. Their faces are weird too, their mouths a lipless slash, three eyes spread in a row across their faces, no noses. Not even Louis could think of these.

“What on earth?” Liam breathes. Another quick assessing glance shows him that the boys have no more clue than him, Harry’s eyes wide and confused still, Niall’s brow furrowed like he’s trying to place them, Louis starting to bristle into defense mode. Zayn’d scrambled onto the couch when he saw them, pressed into the back, and his eyes are wide and bambi-big like they get when he’s terrified, like the first time they’d flown, when he’d held tight to Liam and let him wrap an arm around his shoulders to keep him safe. Liam has to push down the instinct to do that now, to pull Zayn into him so he’ll know nothing will hurt him while Liam’s here, because that’s not true anymore, is it?

“Not Earth!” The voice comes from the—the things. It sounds wrong, the English, too sharp and too garbled at once, but at least it’s English. “Not Earth, no! Not anymore!”

“The fuck?” Louis demands.

The one who spoke—or Liam assumes, anyway—pushes forward, out of about fifteen of them. The rest of them mill behind…it, making some sort of chittering sound that might be talking. “You are not on Earth!” it articulates carefully. It’s wearing a brown robe-thing. “Earth is—there.” It waves out the window, the window that none of them had thought to look out yet, and bounces on flat feet that are more like paddles. “Welcome, One Direction! To our ship!”

“Ship?” Liam repeats, but it’s Niall who gets up, and goes to the window.

“Um, guys?” he says, and fuck, because it takes a lot to break Niall’s chill but he sounds like he’s barely keeping it together. “I think we’re in space.”

\---

Everything erupts into chaos. Louis starts yelling at the—aliens, Liam guesses, fucking aliens, how the hell are there aliens—the aliens start chittering loudly, Harry gets up in a bound to look out the window. Zayn stays pressed against the back of the couch, breathing evenly, like if he doesn’t he might start freaking out. Liam can’t move. They’re in space. They’re in fucking space, with aliens, who must have—he’s been abducted by aliens. He’s been bloody abducted by aliens.

“Why?” he asks. No one notices. “Why?” he repeats, louder. He needs to know. If he knows why he can figure out how to get them home again. Or at least get Louis to calm down.

“Yes! Why!” The brown robed alien turns to its fellows, and it chitters a little bit. Then four more step out. They’re all wearing different colors—now that Liam looks, he notices all of them are wearing one of five colors. These five have little golden emblems on the front, though, icons Liam can’t quite see.

“Welcome, One Direction.” The one in green says. It raises its hand in what looks like a wave, but Liam’s distracted by the fact that it has six fingers and no thumb, apparently. “We are honored to have you here.”

“We have—waited for this a long time,” the one in yellow picks up. “It is so exciting!”

“Waited for what?” Louis snaps. He’s somehow shifted so he’s in front of Harry and Niall, between them and the aliens. “What do you want?”

The aliens chitter a little, then one in blue steps forward. “No, don’t be afraid, Louis! We are not—supervillains.” Louis’s eyes widen at the sound of his name. “We just wanted to meet you!”

“To meet us?” Niall echoes.

“’Course!” The yellow one chirps. It sways forward, and Liam can feel Zayn flinch back. Liam’s hand twitches, but he doesn’t reach out like he would have, to intertwine their fingers in reassurance. That wouldn’t help Zayn.  “And of course, we had to bring you for your concert!”

“Concert?” Harry repeats.

“What, is that, like, an experiment?” Louis asks. The aliens are chittering, and jumping up and down a little, but none of them are looking away from the five of them.

“What are they going to do?” Niall demands, breathless. “Are they—what’s—”

“You’re not going to fucking probe me with anything,” Louis goes on, “I know we’re prime specimens but over my dead body—”

 “No, “Zayn interrupts, his voice low and amazed. “No, like. They’re—they’re fans.”

The chittering starts, loud, and Liam thinks he hears the echo of _Zayn_ in it, then the one in red turns and says something sharp-sounding at them, and they quiet. “Yes, fans!” It agrees, its mouth twisting. Maybe into a smile? Liam hopes so. “Directioners! The biggest fans,” it adds, drumming its fingers on its arm. “Bigger than the—” a chittering sounds. “We found you!”

“Then why’s he here?” Louis demands, jerking his head at Zayn. Zayn winces.

The one in red drums its hands faster. “Zayn is—” it’s cut off by the one in blue chittering, and then suddenly the one in red is pushing at it and the one in blue pushes back and grabs some silvery tool thing from under the robe that makes a sound that’s whirring and—

“We’re happy to meet you!” Liam says, loudly. He doesn’t want—fuck, he doesn’t know what’s happening, but them fighting can’t be good. “We’re always glad to meet fans.”

“Yeah!” Harry chips in. He grins, long and slow, and Liam doesn’t know why he’s doing the sex appeal thing to a bunch of aliens, but it seems to work, because they quiet. “’specially ones who have come from so far.”

“Harry,” the one in green says, or maybe all the ones in green say, like some sort of Toy Story quote. Harry looks taken aback for a second, but then he shrugs.

“If you just wanted to meet us,” Liam says, slowly. He’s still not sure what’s happening, but they’re fans, okay. He can do this. He can meet—aliens. He can meet them and get them all home and not think about Zayn sitting next to him at all. He just needs to get everyone home safe. “We’re happy to sign things before you send us home.”

“Home, yes! But a concert! We have a stage!” The one in yellow proclaims, still bouncing. “Your stage!”

“A stage?”

“We can’t—we have to get home, though,” Zayn says. He’s sounding lost, and Liam just wants to hug him. “We’ve got—like, our families.”

“And some of us have commitments,” Louis adds. “We’ve got a show tonight, right? Topeka.”

“And an interview,” Niall adds. “And recording.”

“But we want a concert!” The alien…whines. It stops bouncing. “We want to see you, Niall.” The other ones in yellow chitter excitedly.  

“The other commitments can leave,” the one in blue says. Its hand drums on its chest.  “We can leave them.”

“They aren’t optional,” Liam argues. He’s arguing with an alien. “We have a commitment to our fans.

The blue one slaps its hand hard against its chest. “We are fans. We have traveled far. Earth has had the concerts it needs.” A few others also slap their chests. Others are chittering lowly. “We will have a concert. The commitments can be fireworked.” It hums something, and Liam realizes it’s a few bars of Girl Almighty.

“But—”

“No, a concert’s good,” Zayn cuts Louis off. Like every time he says anything, the chittering rises and falls excitedly, especially among the ones in red. “A concert, yeah. They can—like, it can—don’t fireworks anything. A concert first, that’s good.”

“And why the fuck do you get to say that—” Louis snaps, but the red robed aliens start chittering loudly and pounding at their chests, and he subsides. “I don’t even know why you’re here.”

“Zayn is important!” one of the red ones in back calls out, and it gets echoes, before the yellow one spins to chitter at all of them.

“Concert!” It says, at last, loudly. “Concert, yes yes! Commitments later. No fireworks.”

“Good!” The one in red is staring at Zayn in a way Liam knows a little too well, like he hung the stars and moon. “Good yes concert! And meet! We’ve traveled far to find you! Not like the—” another chittering sound. “They stay and just listen. We see you in person.”

“Good for you.” Harry smiles again, dimpling in his most disarming way.

“But this is a lot,” Liam puts in. They need to talk about this. He doesn’t know exactly what’s happening, or why Zayn’s decided he’s allowed to agree to a concert for all of them, but they need to discuss, and they need to figure out what the hell they’re doing in space, and also _aliens_. If there’s ever been a time for a band meeting, it’s now. “Can we maybe have some time to talk?”

“Oh-tee-five!” someone from the crowd shouts, and then is hushed.

“Yes yes!” the brown-robed one confirms.

“And clothes, maybe?” Harry asks, and for the first time, Liam realizes he’s been naked for this whole time. He shrugs when Liam gapes at him. “What? You know I sleep naked.”

\---

The alien’s are barely out of the room, all of them twisting to look at the boys and herded out by the one in brown, who’s chittering sharply and also giving Liam lingering looks, before Louis rounds on Zayn. “What the hell? What sort of right do you have to agree to a concert? You aren’t even in—”

“’Cause I don’t want anything blown up?” Zayn interrupts. “I don’t know exactly what that meant, but the—it was holding a gun. He talked about bloody fireworks, what do you think that means?”

“That our concert has fireworks in it?” Louis drawls

“He talked about fireworksing our commitments back on earth!” Zayn shoots back. “That’s pretty damn clear.”

“You mean we’re doing a concert for the fate of the earth?” Harry says, sounding intrigued. Liam wishes he could, but holy shit, he hadn’t even thought of that. He’d just thought about getting them home safe, not about—any of that. Zayn would, though. Of course he’d focus on the danger. 

“Great, that’s not pressure or nothing,” Niall mutters. He lifts a hand to nibble on his nails.

“None at all,” Louis agrees sarcastically, and Liam shoots him a glare. They need Niall not to be freaking out, not to freak him out more. “Now we just have to play a concert for aliens who might blow us or the world up, and—”

“Louis,” Liam snaps. Louis whirls to glare at him.

“What? It’s the truth.”

“It’s kind of cool, though, yeah?” Harry muses. He wanders to the window. Somehow, him being naked makes it more normal, not less, and Liam doesn’t really want to think about that either. “We’re in space. Wonder what this ship is like.” He raises his eyebrows as he looks out. “Yeah, those look like guns, huh.”

“Wonder if it can hold us up,” Louis adds, and Niall flinches, his head thunking back against the wall. Liam wants to reach out to him, but he’s never been good at that, at grounding Niall. He’s always too much, just makes him more claustrophobic, but Louis’s still freaking out and Harry’s too busy looking out the window.

It’s Zayn who gets up—and then Louis’s between him and Niall, his eyes fierce. Zayn rolls his eyes, and shoves past him, before he crouches next to Niall, wraps a hand around the back of his neck. Liam can’t hear what he says, but he can see Niall’s face as he looks up at him, the way he smiles, like he only smiles at Zayn, and fuck Liam’s missed that smile.

Liam’s missed this. Missed all of them together. Missed having Zayn here, knowing he’s here, how he looks at Liam and how he felt in Liam’s arms. Four months. It’s the longest he’s gone without touching Zayn since they met.

And that doesn’t matter. Because Zayn’s not—he wasn’t happy with this, and Liam didn’t fix that, and he left. It was better for him, Liam tells himself, as Zayn’s hand drags over Niall’s neck, soft as ever.

“So,” Liam says. He needs to get a hold of this. He pushes thoughts about Zayn down, far down, like he’s gotten so good at in the past three years, the past four months. “We need to get out of here.”

“Thanks, Liam. Never would have guessed. It didn’t occur to you we’re in bloody space?” Louis retorts. They all ignore him. He needs to vent, Liam knows, but it’s not helping now.

“Why am I here, though?” Zayn asks. He stands up, his hand falling away from Niall. But Niall seems like he’s gathered himself, more or less, though he wriggles a little so he’s pushed against Zayn’s calf. “Like, I’m not—they want One Direction. If I tell them I’m not in One Direction anymore, think they’d let me go?”

It doesn’t hurt any less to hear him say it than to hear anyone else, Liam finds, but, “Fuck you!” Louis bursts out, stalking forward. “You’re just going to fucking leave us here so you can do whatever the fuck you want again? You fucking—”

Zayn doesn’t flinch back, never has from Louis’s anger. “So I could get help,” he shoots back. “So I could—I dunno, like, tell someone, or—”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Liam puts in. Louis shoots a glare at him Liam knows perfectly well, that oh-so-knowing glare about just why he might think Zayn leaving is a bad idea. But he doesn’t know anything. Liam wants Zayn safe and happy more than anything. But, “If they were willing to blow up the earth to get a concert, I don’t know how they’d react to you having left the band.”

“And anyway, I don’t think there’s much Earth could do,” Harry points out, thoughtfully. “Unless they’re keeping a lot secret from the public. Those guns are pretty big.”

“And then I kinda doubt they’d stop it being a secret to save a bunch of blokes,” Niall agrees. His voice is even again, at least, though his shoulder’s still pressed into Zayn’s thigh, and Zayn’s hand is resting on his shoulder.

Zayn sighs, deflates. His head drops. “Fuck. It was an idea.”

“Of course your first idea is one that meant you leaving,” Louis mutters.

“Louis—” Zayn’s sharp beginning is cut off by the door opening again, and a bunch of aliens come in, another ten or so. They separate, and Liam’s swarmed by two brown ones, who hold out a pair of what looks like jeans and a t-shirt that he vaguely recognizes. He braces himself, but his finger brushes against one as he takes the jeans. Their skin is rough, almost like a shark’s—but it makes a squeaking sound and nearly jumps a foot. It chitters excitedly at the other, who chitters back, looking at its hand like it’s going to explode.

They don’t seem to be leaving, so Liam strips off his pajama pants to pull on the clothes. They don’t feel right at all, the cloth too smooth, but they’re something, at least. Across from him, Harry’s cheerfully pulling on a flamingo-patterned shirt before even putting on his pants with a group of green-robed aliens staring up at him, and Niall’s quickly tugged on his jeans and a Derby jersey with the yellow-robed ones around him. Louis’s glaring at a group of blue-robed aliens who are gazing back at him, wide-eyed, until he huffs out a breath and yanks off his pants.

Zayn’s just staring at the red-robed aliens around him, who are staring back.

“Zayn?” Liam calls. He wants to go over, but there are aliens in the way, and anyway he wouldn’t be helpful. “Everything good?”

“Yeah, just.” Zayn looks around, lowers his voice. “Not used to it anymore, I guess.”

“Who’s fault is that?” Louis snaps, and Zayn just gives him a long look before he tugs off his own shirt.

Liam looks away before he can see if there’s anything else about Zayn that he missed, down at the brown-robed aliens still circling him. “Is there anything else?” he asks. They both jump again, chitter more, but they don’t say anything.

“I don’t think they speak English,” Niall says, curiously. He’s clearly gotten over his panic. Zayn always was the best at doing that, at making everyone feel better. “Or not all of them.”

“I—say—little,” one of the red ones says. It doesn’t look away from Zayn. “Girl almighty! One direction. Little things.”

“Stockholm syndrome,” one of the green one adds proudly. It tugs on Harry’s jeans, so he looks down. “Stockholm!”

“Yeah!” Harry grins, then makes a confused shrug over its head.

“So, no English, great,” Louis confirms. “Or only song titles.”

“Songs!” The one still holding onto Harry agrees. “Song! Sing!”

“Sing! Sing!” The others take up the chant, their hands pounding on their chests. Harry looks at the rest of them, cocks his head.

“Give ‘em a preview?” Niall suggests. “How ‘bout that thing you showed us last week?”

“No!” Liam yelps. He knows Zayn will hear it eventually, but he doesn’t want to see Zayn’s face when he hears lyrics about losing someone without realizing it. About letting someone good when your paths separate. About missing all your chances to make something better.  

“Um.” Zayn makes a noise, then purses his lips pointedly when they all look at him. “How about something from Four, please?”

“Right. Night Changes, then?”

“If Zayn still remembers it,” Louis puts in.

But when Zayn starts, he clearly does remember it. He remembers it, and so does Liam, how Zayn sounds like this, the purr and warmth of his voice. How it feels to stand next to Zayn and sing, for their voices to mix like this, even as the aliens are chittering and they’re in fucking space. Liam closes his eyes, so he can ignore that part, because he’s not sure he can deal with everything all at once.

It’s not good, he knows. It’s sloppy, because they’ve had four months of compensating for Zayn not being there, and so Niall tries to sing Zayn’s part and Zayn’s voice doesn’t quite fit the new harmonies they’re doing, and Liam’s still smiling when they’re done because they wrote the song for five voices and it sounds right again.

He opens his eyes again—only to find half the aliens sprawled on the ground, the other half with their arms wrapped around each other. “One Direction!” they hum, together. The ones standing are bouncing up and down. “One Direction! Night changes! Look how fast!”  

One of the red robed ones stands, makes a little jumping thing. “Thank you,” it says, carefully. “We—treasure.”

“You’re welcome,” Niall replies, and then they’re all on their feet and they’ve left again, buzzing quietly, just as another bunch come in, yelling ‘Sing! Sing!’

\---

“You need to get your shit together,” Liam mutters to Louis. They’ve finally managed a second alone; this new batch is mainly red and green robes, so half of them are crawling all over Harry, and he’s laughing as they tug on his curls and listen to his stories. The other half are crowded around Zayn, staring. He’s not laughing, is in fact holding onto the arms of the chair quite tensely, but he’s not pushing them off. Liam’s heard some of them asking each other—or maybe Zayn—something about “Real?”

In any case, it means Liam can get Louis aloneish, pulled off to a corner where they can whisper. One of the green ones saw them go and nodded sagely, then turned to the other and whispered something that sounded like ‘band parents’, to which the other had nodded and turned back to stroking Harry’s shirt.

“I need to get my shit together?” Louis retorts. “We’re on a fucking alien space ship and who knows if we’ll get home again and they’re some sort of insane fans or something and—”

“About Zayn,” Liam cuts him off, before he can get full rant. “They can’t know you’re mad at him. Or why.”

“Don’t see why not. Just ‘cause you want him back—”

“Don’t act like you don’t!” Liam snaps. From across the room, Zayn glances at him, his head cocked in a question, like he can read Liam’s mood just from the cadence of his voice. Liam nods, and Zayn gives him a quick, tight smile back, before he twitches at another alien’s touch. Liam takes a deep breath. He needs to stay even. For his boys. He can do this. “You know how the fans reacted. We can’t risk that here.”

“Yeah. That’s why you’re pissed at me for being mad at him for abandoning us.”

“He didn’t abandon us,” Liam replies tightly, for what feels like the thousandth time. Maybe this time, he’ll manage to get the conviction to convince Louis. “He didn’t love it, he needed—”

“He did!” Louis’s voice is rising. “He did, and just ‘cause you’ve been bloody in l—”

Liam slaps a hand over his mouth before he can finish the sentence. When one of the yellow aliens who’d been showing Niall what looked like a miniature guitar looked over at him, he shrugs, and it nods like he understands. Louis’s eyes narrow, but he nods, and Liam lets his hand fall. “Fine. I’ll play nice. But fuck him, Liam. And not in the way you want.”

There’s an intake of breath, and for a second Liam thinks Zayn heard, after four fucking years of being three-quarters in love with him—but then he looks. Zayn didn’t hear, he thinks, because he’s stiff as a board, and one of the aliens is stroking his cheekbones, and another is patting his hair, and another is actually poking at his eyelashes, and Liam knows he can’t fix anything, that he doesn’t know how, that he already failed to make this good for Zayn once—but he lets Louis go with a final glare, then strides across the room. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Louis watch him, then he wanders back towards Harry.

Zayn looks up, and the hopeful, slightly desperate smile takes him back, to a hundred hotel rooms where Zayn had curled against his side for a little reminder of home. “Liam?”

“Can I borrow him?” Liam asks the aliens, politely. But it’s not polite as he wraps a hand around Zayn’s arm, and pulls him to standing. The aliens all fall off, except for one that grabs onto Zayn’s other arm and holds on, hanging there, until one of its fellows pulls—or maybe tries to climb on it so it can get up Zayn—and they both fall.

Liam instinctively wraps his arm around Zayn’s waist, pulls him close. He can feel him shaking, from this close, and he uses that to distract from how this feels as right as it always had.

“Sorry,” Zayn mutters, mostly to the aliens, probably. He doesn’t move away from Liam. “Sorry, just—that’s my face, yeah?”

“But—human?” asks one.

Another, who has wings that looks suspiciously like the one Zayn has on his chest on its robe, shakes his head. “We have bet,” it informs Zayn. “I say—perfect human….” A chittering noise that Liam guesses is a name, for how he gestures at one next to it. “says not. Test?” It pulls a needle out of its robe, and Zayn swears and tries to push behind Liam.

“Fuck no,” he spits. The alien’s face—well, Liam thinks it falls. Zayn sighs, but Liam can feel how quickly he’s breathing “No,” he says, softer. “I’m human, I swear.”

“Can’t be!” the other alien argues. “Face! Need proof!”

“Yeah, his face is a bit much,” Liam agrees, his fingers digging into Zayn’s arm to keep him here. “But, I need to, um, talk to him. Over by the window.”

He tugs, and Zayn doesn’t hesitate before trotting over to the window with him. He doesn’t pull away from Liam until they get there, and then he just turns to rest his head in the crook of Liam’s neck. Liam’s arms go around him like they always have, holding him there as Zayn’s breathing slows down. Liam ducks his head so his temple is against Zayn’s hair, inhales. He still smells like him. His hands still tighten on Liam’s shoulder the same way, like he’s finding steady ground in Liam.

“Good?” he murmurs, as Zayn’s breath slows to normal, and he stops shaking.

“No.” Zayn’s voice is quiet, breathed into his neck. “I’m in a fucking spaceship, and I want to go home, and Louis’d as soon throw me out into space as look at me, and Niall looks like he thinks I’m going to disappear, and you won’t touch me, and I hate it. I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

“I touch you.” Liam can feel his heart speeding up, but there’s nothing he can do about any of the rest of it. No way he can make Zayn happy.

“Not like you used to.” Zayn gives one last, choppy, breath, then lifts his head. “And I’m dying for a cigarette.”

It gets a smile out of Liam, like he thinks it was meant to. A smile, and Liam loosening his arms so Zayn can step away, because he’s never been able to think with Zayn that close. Or only with him that close. “Bet they’d get you one, if you asked.”

“Yeah, but the fuck would be in it?” Zayn shakes his head. “I’ll live. I’ve basically quit.”

“Yeah?” Liam can’t help the proud smile.

“Yeah.” Zayn nods, and leans against the wall, so their shoulders bump together. “’s easier, when I’m home.”

Of course it is. Liam can feel his face fall. Of course it’s easier, away from them. Where Zayn’s happy.

Zayn must see that, because he huffs out a breath. “I didn’t mean…” He shakes his head, then starts again. “I was sorry to hear about Sophia,” he says, giving Liam a hopeful look that Liam knows, the one where he’s trying to change the subject.

“Me too.” Liam tips his head back. He is sorry for Sophia, about Sophia. She’d been—fuck, she’d been amazing, too good for him by far, and it was about time she figured that out. She deserved more than him. More than someone who’d been mostly in love with their best friend since he was eighteen. He’d loved her, and he thought she knew that, hoped she did, that he loved her still—but he remembers the sad look in her eyes after he’d started talking about a comic Zayn would’ve liked, for what was probably the twentieth time that week. _I’ve always known you’ve had that—thing_ , she’d said, so tactfully, like always. _But it feels like you don’t think about anyone else anymore, and I can’t do that._

And then she’d been gone, too. Liam can’t even argue with her. When Zayn had been there, it had been easy to compartmentalize. There was Sophia, who was lovely and everything he could want in a girlfriend, and then there was Zayn. Who was Zayn, and who Liam hadn’t had a chance against since the bungalow, when he’d first taken a shy Liam and listened to every word he said, like no one else had. With Zayn gone, when all he could do was wonder what he could have done differently…he doesn’t blame Sophia for leaving. Which probably says more than it should, that he doesn’t blame her, when even now, with Zayn next to him, his heart’s too heavy to say anything.

“You guys looked so happy, I really thought you’d go the distance,” Zayn says, and Liam bites his lip. “I—it wasn’t—I didn’t mess anything up, did I?”

“No.” It’s not entirely a lie. It wasn’t Zayn who messed things up. Zayn had a right to be unhappy, to need to leave. Liam knew that. He did. Liam just—Liam should have done something different. And Liam really doesn’t want to talk about this, either. “I was sorry to hear about Perrie.”

“Yeah, well.” Zayn shrugs. “Guess it wasn’t a good time for girlfriends, yeah?”

“Taking time off didn’t help?” Zayn gives him a quick, questioning look, but Liam’s honestly curious. He doesn’t know why anyone would give up Zayn when she had him.

“Nah, like.” Zayn shrugs again. “It was good for a while, yeah? Being together, not having tour and all that shit. But then…” he trails off. Liam waits patiently, looking around the room while Zayn gathers his thoughts. Niall’s somehow acquired a guitar, to no one’s surprise, and is doing some sort of sing along, but Harry’s drawn Louis aside too, and they’re talking intently over the aliens’ heads. The red and brown aliens are gazing at Liam and Zayn, and the brown one that seems to be in charge is jumping up and down and chittering to one next to it, but Liam can’t give this up to talk to them.

“But I’d never, like, we’d never actually spent that much time together, yeah?” Zayn says at last. “Or if we had, it had always been just, like, stolen, before I went off again. So when we did have time, I dunno. It just, it wasn’t going to work, I guess. Not forever.”

“Sorry.” He is. Liam’s always wanted Zayn happy. Zayn gives a small, weak smile; glances up at Liam through his lashes.

“Fucking hell!” Harry yelps, and both Zayn and Liam jolt, look over. Harry’s on his ass on the couch, where Louis must have shoved him away, blinking confusedly up at him. “What was that for?”

Louis’s not looking at him; he’s got his gaze fixed on one of the aliens, who’s chittering excitedly and hopping up and down and pointing. “No,” he snaps at it. “We were just talking.”

“Louis—” Liam sighs.

“Shut up, Liam.” Louis’s still staring down the blue-robed alien. “We were talking. That’s all. Because you bloody abducted us, and—” He takes a long step away from Harry. “See? See how far away we are?”  

“Louis, it didn’t say anything,” Harry puts in, getting to his feet with a wince, rubbing at his ass.

Louis whirls, glaring at everyone. “I know the look in its eyes,” he states, and turns his back pointedly on Harry. One of the other green aliens starts chittering angrily at the blue robed one, then another blue robed one adds its voice. A red robed one says something, trying to cut in—and the first one’s going for its gun.

“Bloody hell,” Harry swears, and falls back against the couch. Zayn’s rubbing his temple, shaking his head incredulously. Liam knows how they feel.

\---

“So, how’d you, like, find out about us?” Liam asks a brown one with chevrons on the sleeve of its robe. They’ve all calmed down somewhat, or maybe this one’s a calmer group, with more ones with the insignia that Liam thinks means they’ve learned more English. Harry’s playing what looks like pat-a-cake, Louis’s are sort of clinging to his legs as he sits there and looks at his phone, though they’d found out pretty quickly they didn’t get reception, and Niall’s playing with an instrument that Liam’s never seen before, but the aliens and him are laughing at the discordant sound coming from it. Even Zayn’s relaxed, from what Liam can see; his seem to be showing him things on what looks like paper, from a good foot away.

“The arena,” it answers. “We have—we see? Your concerts there. All of us. From your…internet?”

“You get internet here?”

“Not here. In the arena.” The others nod. “It is a—place,” it explains, “A place where we can see. And tumblr!”

“Tumblr?” Liam echoes. Fuck. Aliens on tumblr.

“Of course! How else are we to pick our fave?” the alien asks matter-of-factly, gesturing at its robe. “We held the arena for One Direction. No one drives us away.”

“Good for you.” Or so Liam assumes.

“For you!” Another alien pipes it. “Girl Almighty led us to victory!”

“Stay made of lightning!” they all cry, clapping. “We stay made of lightning!”

“The— _chitter chitter_ —had no chance,” the most fluent one says proudly. “We are true fans. We .would not disappoint One Direction.”

“Girl Almighty? Why that one?” It sounds like a dance off, maybe, and Liam loves that song but it’s not the best for that. “Wouldn't Steal My Girl be better?”

“It goes well with the sound of their screams as they shrivel into ash,” the alien replies, off-hand. “Steal My Girl is for when they retreat in shameful retreat. Do you have pictures of Loki?”

“Um, right,” Liam can only say, and goes for his phone.

\---

“We’re going to need to rehearse,” Harry points out, as the next group leaves. They’ve all somehow congregated together on a couch a little too small for all of them, so Zayn’s squeezed between Liam and Niall, with Niall’s hand still on one arm like if he lets go Zayn will disappear. Despite that, Zayn’s somehow mainly on Liam’s lap. Liam’s keeping his hands by his side, not on Zayn’s hips to steady him. He’s fine as he is, clearly. “See the stage, at least.”

“Good point.” Louis nods. “Oi, you!”

One of the blue robed ones jumps, nearly falls over, then manages to stay afoot. “Yes yes!”

“Can we have a look at the stage?” he demands.

“Yes yes!” it repeats, nodding. Then it darts away after its friends. Or maybe not friends, Liam doesn’t know. Fellow aliens.

“Well, that went well,” Niall observes. He looks around, at the empty room, and pulls on one of the messy braids Harry’s hair has ended up in. “Looking good, Styles.”

“Latest alien fashion,” Harry agrees. “This is actually sort of fun!”

“’s an adventure,” Niall agrees. “Outer space!”

 “It’s—they actually fight over internet for us,” Liam breathes. He’s still stuck on that. “Proper fight. People—aliens— _die._ It’s like we’re gods, or something.” It’s weird. But it’s sort of amazing too. They’re properly in space, with aliens, and that’s just—it feels like Liam’s in a comic book.

“Don’t mind being worshipped,” Louis adds, “Bit nice.”

Next to him, Liam can feel Zayn sink into his side, shake his head. “As long as they send us home.”

“Cheery,” Harry rolls his eyes, and elbows him. But this is everything Zayn hates, Liam knows. Zayn never did like adventures, not big ones like this. He liked adventures he could control, playing pranks with Louis or running off for a bit. Not being so far from home, not not knowing where he was. That was the part of the job he’d hated, part of what he couldn’t deal with. He never liked that, preferred adventures that were in his head, in art or books. Liam had just thought…thought that maybe they could figure out how to make it better. Thought maybe that if he put his arms around Zayn, could make him a home with Liam, he could make it better. But clearly he was wrong, so he doesn’t now, either.

“And you’re the only one who’s home, anyway,” Louis adds. “The rest of us are still working.”

“Wonder what the press is saying,” Niall jumps in, before Louis can keep on and Zayn can snap back again. “Think they’ve noticed yet? How long have we been here?”

“One Direction disappears? Yeah, they’ll have noticed,” Louis drawls. “Probably a publicity stunt.”

“A writing retreat, maybe?” Liam suggests. That sounds plausible. “As long as they don’t see Zayn’s gone too…”

“Not like he ever emerges from his house, how would they know? Unless Shahid complains his cash cow’s gone—”

“Fuck off,” Zayn snaps.

“Sorry, am I insulting your new best friend?”

“No, you’re being an asshole.” Zayn surges to his feet, so he can look at Louis. “You’re mad at me, that’s fine. But you keep fucking starting things.”

“Not with you!” Louis’s on his feet too, and Liam shares a nervous glance with Niall. Louis and Zayn argued rarely, but when they did, it was always explosive. “You’re the one who was bitchy at me, I was just defending myself when your new BFF was being an arsehole, I haven’t said a bloody word about you—”

“You don’t have to! It’s fucking clear what you’re talking about!”

“Oh, that’s not self-centered—”

“It’s just true,” Zayn snaps. “You want to be mad at me, be mad at me. But have the balls to do it to my face.”

“Can’t, you left, didn’t you? Ran away and decided your solo career was more important, couldn’t stand up against a few rumors—”

“It’s not about the solo career, and you know that. You knew I was thinking about it!” Liam winces. They all had known, or suspected, but Liam had thought—he’d thought it was just exhaustion. That he’d have time. That it wasn’t that bad. “And it wasn’t just a few rumors.”

“Sure it was. And you know, you did—”

“Come talk to me when you get death threats for being who you are,” Zayn retorts, “You don’t know—”

“The fuck I don’t!”

“Louis.” Harry’s on his feet, and he wraps a hand around Louis’s shoulders, like they’re kids again and he can calm him down. “Just take a second—”

“We all get media, it’s part of the gig, you knew that—”

“And that wasn’t what I wanted.” Zayn’s voice is sharp, and Liam thinks he can see Harry’s hands tighten on Louis, but really he’s just looking at Zayn. Zayn, and the way he’s holding himself, straight and strong on his own, like Liam hasn’t seen him since—fuck, for years. How hadn’t he noticed? “That wasn’t what I wanted, Louis. I know it was shitty how it happened, and I’m sorry for that, I guess, but not that I did it. And if you were my friend, you’d be happy for me too.”

“I—”

“Are you happy?” Liam asks, his voice hoarse. He can’t not, he has to know. If he—if it worked. If it worked, he thinks he can live with this. If Zayn did follow his heart the right way.

Zayn turns to look at him, and he softens, like Liam’s used to, when Zayn looks at him. Softens into the Zayn Liam’s loved since he can remember. “Yeah,” he says. Gently, like he knows it hurts. “Yeah, I am.”

He is, too. Liam can see it.  He’s been able to see it, in the pictures of Zayn, in how he stood on that stage for the Asian awards and made his own speech, in how he’s gained weight he’s always needed and the circles under his eyes are gone. In how much looser he seems, despite the aliens. He’s happy, in a way Liam couldn’t make him. In a way he didn’t let Liam try to make him, Liam can’t help but think. But he’s happy, and, that’s what matters. It has to be.  

“Then that’s—”

The door opens, and Liam’s cut off by a flock of aliens surging in. They dart around them, almost knocking Zayn over until he stumbles back and Liam can catch him.

“We have come to take you to the stage!” the brown one with the emblem on his robe, who seems to be in charge, says formally. “Please come.”

Liam looks at Louis over Zayn’s shoulders, then down at Zayn’s hair. But Louis just nods, tightly, and Zayn doesn’t feel angry, so Liam looks at Harry and nods too.

“Lead the way.” Harry claps his hand, then nearly falls over when one of the green ones grabs onto his thigh to tug him out the door.

It’s hard to walk, a bit, because the aliens keep getting in the way, pulling at their shirts and hands, and also Liam can’t help keeping Zayn tucked against his side. Zayn doesn’t seem like he wants to move away, and it feels almost normal, having Zayn there next to him, a quiet support.

Except the corridor they’re led into is definitely not anything they’ve ever seen before. It’s barely tall enough for a person, so Liam and Harry both have to slouch a little. The walls are silver, or so Liam thinks, but it’s hard to tell because they’re literally papered with pictures of their faces. Some of them Liam recognizes from promos, some are candids, some are—well, Liam’s fairly sure they never dressed up like the Avengers, but it looks real enough. He tries not to think too hard about Tony Stark Zayn, he has enough dreams about him as it is.

And it doesn’t seem to just be that corridor—every time they turn, every intersection, there’s just more, Zayn and Harry and Louis and Niall and Liam staring down at him, until it’s like whenever he looks in a mirror too long. He can’t not look at them, at all the pictures, and he looks good in some but other are of him—god, that hair, he can’t believe he did that. And looking at himself with buzzcut seems to pale with Zayn next to him; why did he think he could pull it off when Zayn’s there showing him what it could be? And then—

“Forgot how cute a kid you were,” Zayn murmurs, hooking a hand around Liam’s head to bring him down so he can whisper in his ear. “Remember when you straightened your hair?”

Liam forces out a chuckle. Hard to forget, when that picture’s right in front of them, life size. “Yeah. Don’t know why I thought I could.”

“It was cute.” Zayn chuckles, and ruffles Liam’s hair. “You’re always cute.”

“Easy for you to say,” Liam mutters. Every picture on the walls of Zayn is good. Every picture of Zayn is good.

“Easy for both of us to say,” Zayn corrects. “Stop looking, babe. They love you. Clearly.”

“Hard to look anywhere else.”

“Okay, well. Think about figuring out a set list,” Zayn replies, and Liam takes a deep breath. It’s so easy with Zayn here, with Zayn looking at him like Liam’s good, like he’s amazing and competent and enough. He misses this, with an ache that only somewhat has to do with being in love with him. He just wants this—no. He shouldn’t. “Probably old classics, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Liam exhales. One of the brown robed aliens is looking at him intently, in what Liam guesses is worry; Liam gives it his best smile, and it jumps nearly to the ceiling, then falls back into a red robed one who’s too distracted staring at Zayn to properly catch it before they both fall over. “Yeah, okay.”

\---

“Wow.”

Liam nods at Niall’s amazed exhale. The stage in front of them is—impressive. Impressive in that it’s an exact replica of the On The Road Again stage, down to the lay of the wiring, except a raised platform in the farthest part of the stage that juts into the audience.

“What’s that?” Harry asks, gesturing to it. One of the green aliens squeaks, then turns to the brown robed alien with the golden insignia, and starts chittering. The brown alien jumps, then chitters to another blue robed alien. It shakes its head and grabs onto Louis’s leg, hard enough that Louis almost stumbles; the brown one makes a noise that Liam feels he sympathizes with even if he can’t entirely interpret it, and turns to a yellow one. The yellow one gives Niall a longing look, but then it sighs and scampers off.

“Is for—speakers?” The original green one says, slowly.

“Speakers?”

“The—the front men,” the brown one attempts. “The management?”

Zayn’s eyebrows rise up. “You mean, like, the government?” He pauses as a wave of chittering spreads over the aliens, and as a whole they all spin to stare at him, their mouths gaping. Zayn flushes, but he doesn’t duck back into Liam. Liam—fuck it, Liam gives his shoulder a comforting rub anyway. There are aliens, maybe Zayn will appreciate it. He appreciates it, at least. “Like, the people who run things here?”

“Yes yes!” the brown one agrees. “Government! This is where government happens. They talk to us here. Decide things. Like you, on stage!”

One of the red ones strokes at Zayn’s thigh. Zayn does twitch at that, and Liam makes himself loosen his hold on Zayn before he grabs him again, pulls him away from the things that make him hurt. “Smart!” it declares, at one of the green aliens. “Yes yes!”

The green alien chitters back, pointing at Harry so intensely it nearly stabs him before Harry jumps out of the way. A blue one jumps in, then, but apparently it doesn’t say anything the other two agree with, because suddenly they spin and start yelling at it.

The one with the insignia makes a screeching noise, and the boys wince as the aliens fall silent. It reaches out, grabs Zayn’s hand, then Harry’s, and brings them together. Liam can see the tension in Zayn’s muscles as he’s moved, but Harry wraps his fingers around Zayn’s, grins, and he relaxes. It doesn’t hurt or anything, that he can do that to Zayn. Harry and Zayn have always had their own thing, and Liam knows that it’s only gotten more so since Zayn left, Harry the one who seems to have accepted Zayn leaving the best, who understood, somehow. Who still texted Zayn random photos for laughs.  

“Friends?” The alien asks.

Zayn glances up at Harry, Harry shrugs. “Friends.”

“Nah, I don’t like you very much,” Zayn teases back, and Harry’s grin grows. “You’re a bit of a weirdo.”

“Heyyy,” Harry whines, dimpling, and for a second they could be back in any green room, the two of them teasing at each other.

“Friends,” The alien states, and oh right, they aren’t. “All friends.”

“All friends,” Liam confirms. The brown one lights up, chittering to itself, but then turns sternly back to the others, and starts chittering something emphatically, still holding Harry and Zayn’s hands together. Suddenly, red robed one lunges out of the crowd, and grabs Zayn’s other hand, drags it over to Niall. Then there’s a blue one grabbing at Liam’s hand until he’s holding hands with Louis, and Louis’s somehow been connected to Niall, and Harry’s got Liam’s other hand, and all the aliens are yelling at each other, even the brown robed one, who’s let go of Harry and Zayn to try to drag Liam’s hand on Louis towards Zayn, except that there’s another brown one grabbing at Liam and Louis’s hands and won’t let it go. Another blue one’s wrestled Harry’s hand out of Zayn’s, and there’s a green one trying to get Louis and Niall apart, and suddenly all the others are turning on them and shoving until they’re away from the boys, and the five of them are just left clutching at each other’s hands.

“Um.” Niall glances down at the center of the circle, where most of their hands are overlapped in some pile. “What just happened?”

“I think it was a ship war?” Zayn says, also staring at their hands. Harry squeezes, hard enough Liam can see.

“Yeah, that blue was trying to get me and Haz together was definitely one of them,” Louis agrees. He shrugs when that gets him skeptical looks. “Told you, I can recognize their eyes.”

It seems to strike them all simultaneously, that they’re standing on stage in a circle, their hands in the center, and they all let go.

“So, um.” Zayn rubs at his neck. “I should, I mean, we should rehearse, yeah?”

“And alone,” Louis adds. “Can’t have them noticing how out of practice you are, right?” Liam glares at him, ready to yell, because he’s not making anything easier—but Louis’s gaze is fixed on Zayn, and Zayn’s just gazing back, that thing they’d always done where they drop into their own world, the one Liam tried so hard not to be jealous of.

“Lou?” Zayn asks, soft, and Louis shrugs.

“What? I don’t want them to rip you to pieces or anything, I’m not that much of an asshole.”

“No?” Zayn doesn’t look away, and for the first time in a while, Liam watches Louis lose a staring contest.

“Not to you,” Louis mutters.

The silence holds a beat—then there’s a crash, and all of them jump, turning to the stage in time to see one of the red aliens start thumping its chest and grabbing for its gun because someone knocked over Zayn’s microphone as they tried to move the platform.

“Should we help?” Harry asks, biting at his lip, and Liam shrugs.

“Couldn’t hurt,” he agrees, and heads over. He’s almost there when he glances back, to see where the others are. Louis and Zayn have held back, and they’re curved into each other, talking quietly with Zayn’s arm around Louis’s waist and Louis’s hand on his shoulder. It’s—Liam’s happy, he is. Happy that they aren’t mad at each other, that they’re friends again. But still, something’s twisting in him, because they’re talking. Because Louis’s hearing what Zayn has to say, and now they’ll be them again and Liam still doesn’t know what to do with Zayn.

“So the Niall fans are in charge of food?” Niall says, laughing loud enough that it makes Liam look back at where Niall and Harry are ranged around the platform, looking at the five indents. “Legend!”

“But I was a—”

“Baker!” a chorus of aliens fill in for Harry, and he jumps enough he nearly falls over before five different aliens hands catch him and push him back on his feet.

\---

“Fuck it, this isn’t going to work,” Zayn says, collapsing down onto a block, after their tenth attempt at What Makes You Beautiful. It’s not even him who’s the problem, it’s the other four of them, trying to go back to choreo they spent the last months trying to train themselves out of. “Maybe we should just tell them about me.”

“No,” Liam snaps. “No, we’ll get this. We did this for four years, we can do this, come on.”

“Maybe it’ll be better with an audience?” Niall suggests. He settles down next to Zayn, leans his head on Zayn’s shoulder.

“Yeah, instinct,” Harry agrees.

“And anyway, they won’t know if we mess up, they’ve never seen us,” Louis adds, “I already want to kill myself every time we play this song, can we please not do it again?”

“They won’t know?” Liam retorts, incredulously. He knows they’ve been doing this too long and they should move on and it’s not like choreo’s ever been static anyway, but he can’t—they have to do this. They have to be able to. They have to get this right. They have to get this concert right, and Liam needs to get his bloody triangle right. “They’ve memorized every single step we’ve taken! I think they’ll notice that we’ve forgotten how to do the triangle, or that we keep singing Zayn’s solos, or that he’s forgetting lyrics or that it’s wrong and I—”

“Babe.” There are hands on his shoulders, and Liam looks down and Zayn’s there, his hand sliding around Liam’s neck, grounding him, like he always has. “Let’s take a second.”

“But we need to get this right,” Liam protests, but Zayn’s leading him away, into—well, another corner, but the boys are pretending very tactfully they’re on their own, circling around Niall as he fusses with the guitar.

“Sorry,” Liam says, as soon as they get into a place that can at least copy privacy. He drops his face into his hands, rubbing at his temples. “We need a break, I know, but we can get this, I’m sure of it—”

“Liam.” There’s that note in Zayn’s voice, the one Liam’s never been able not respond to, so he looks back up—and it’s Zayn, all soft eyes and full lips and the way he looks at Liam, like he’s not judging, that he thinks whatever Liam’s feeling is valid and good. “Are you mad at me?”

“No.”

“Li, you can be.” Zayn goes on, still soft, but not tentative. He’s always been so sure, so sure in his skin, even when he’s been nervous or angry or worried. He’d always seemed so sure, even when he was scared how other people would see him. Except he hadn’t been, had he? Hadn’t been sure. “I know you were, like you said in the interview, yeah? And it’s, like, it’s allowed, even if it’s not party line. It’d be better to have it out, if you are. I don’t—like, you’re still my best friend. Don’t want this to ruin that.”

“I’m not mad at you,” Liam repeats. He’s not. He can’t be. Zayn’s happy. “I just want you to be happy, and you’re happy now. So I’m not mad.”

“You sure?” Zayn’s hand is on his cheek, now, and it’s so warm, so comforting, just like it was when they were eighteen and Liam found his home in this boy. “Because you’re pretty tense, babe.”

“We’re on a bloody alien ship!”

“Liam.” Zayn just looks at him, his fingers tangled in the hair at the nape of Liam’s neck. His eyes glint in the light, and god, but Liam sometimes thinks the aliens are right, and Zayn can’t be human. “You can talk to me. Can tell me anything, yeah?” He smiles, like he used to when Liam would rant to him about everything, about the stress or how people thought he was overweight or how his girlfriend was acting or how Loki’s been sick. Not happy Liam needs to rant, but welcoming. Always there for Liam. “I promise I can take it.”

He can, Liam knows. He doesn’t need Liam, not anymore. Doesn’t even want him, the parts of him he could give Zayn. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Hm?”

“Why didn’t you tell me it had gotten so bad that you had to leave?” Liam goes on. Now that he’s started, he can’t stop, has never been able to. The anger he’s been trying not to have is coming up, too fast to stop. “I could have done something, we could have figured something out, taken a break or something. I could have—I dunno, I was figuring it out!”

“You knew I wasn’t happy,” Zayn says, slowly. His head’s tilted, a little confused. “You all knew this was probably going to be my last tour. I told you that.”

“But not—I thought I’d have time.” Liam’s fists clench, more for anything to do, because what he wants to do is just hug Zayn to him, to make it right. “I thought I could convince you; I was going to make you happy, again. I was going to fix it.” He sighs. “You just—you didn’t give me the chance.”

Zayn’s hand tightens almost reflexively on Liam’s neck. “I’m not broken, Liam. Just because I don’t want that—”

“Not you! Us. This.” Liam waves around, trying to take in the alien ship, this stage made for them light years away. “The whole—our lives. I would have found a way to make it what you wanted. But you just left, you didn’t let me. You didn’t even ask me.”

“That’s ‘cause I fixed it myself.” Zayn’s hand drops, and he runs a hand over his hair. “I made my life what I wanted it to be, that’s what this is. You don’t always have to take care of me, Liam.”

Liam shakes his head. Sometimes he wishes he were better at this, that he knew all the poetry Zayn did, that he read the sort of books Harry did, just so he could say this better. So he could sort out the emotions in his chest, the love and sadness and fear. How to say that he’d take care of Zayn forever, not because Zayn needs it but because he deserves it, because Zayn is amazing and precious and just the best person Liam knows. “I could have fixed it, though,” Liam repeats, louder. “If you’d just talked to me, if you’d given me a chance—”

“No, babe, you couldn’t have,” Zayn replies, almost snappish. Except he doesn’t get snappish, not at Liam. “There wasn’t anything you could have done. I had to leave, and everyone’s happy now.”

“I’m not!” Liam retorts, then curses. He hadn’t meant to say that. He is. He is happy, because he’s doing what he loves with the boys he loves (not all but enough) and Zayn is happy and they’re friends and maybe Sophia left but he’s happy. “No, fuck, I am. I just—I wish I could have made you happy enough to stay, that’s all.”

“You do.” Zayn’s voice is certain, so very certain like only Zayn can be. He takes a step forward, and now his hands are on Liam’s shoulders and he’s so close, Liam can smell him, and he has to close his eyes. “You do, babe, it’s not your fault. You couldn’t have done anything else. Stayed for four years because of you.” Liam’s eyes open at that, but Zayn’s going on. “For you boys, and the fans. You do make me happy. If I were here with anyone else, I’d be freaking the fuck out, you know? But I’m okay ‘cause you’re here. That’s why I didn’t talk to you.”

“What?” Liam can feel himself form the word, but he doesn’t hear himself say it. It’s hard to focus on anything when Zayn’s close like this, when Zayn’s there telling him Liam helps him, is helping him, even though he thought Zayn didn’t need it.

“Because if anyone could have convinced me to stay, it would have been you.” Zayn licks his lip, the nervous gesture he’s had since he was seventeen, and Liam’s gaze flicks to it before it goes back to his eyes, to the sincerity in them, the way he’s always looked at Liam, like he could do anything. “I knew I had to go, but, like, everything’s better, when you’re there. It was easier. And I couldn’t let that stop me, yeah?” His arms are around Liam, now, and he’s pulling himself close, tucking his head into Liam’s neck as Liam’s arms wrap around him back, like he’s always done. “It wasn’t yours to fix,” he murmurs, “It was mine, and I did. You couldn’t have done anything.”

Liam feels the words in his bones, like they hit a chord that resonates with everything he’s been feeling for the past three months, since Zayn left. All the guilt that had left him helpless, that had driven Sophia away; the guilt that had kept him from just calling Zayn, from being friends like he knew he were. The guilt that had twisted with the love, pushing him away. He feels the words hit the guilt—and he feels the guilt break, as he holds tight to Zayn, and Zayn holds him back just as tight.

“Not to break up the moment,” Harry’s voice is loud, and Liam jolts a little, his arms tightening around Zayn, “But we had a thought.”

“Yeah?” Liam asks. Harry’s crouched on the edge of the stage, looking down at them; Niall and Louis are behind him. None of them look surprised to see Zayn and Liam hugging like this; Louis even winks, as Zayn’s head’s still buried in Liam’s shoulder.

“What are we going to do about a band?” Louis asks, plopping down so he can sit on the edge of the stage. “I think it’s going to be a soundtrack, but Harold here reckons it’ll be the aliens playing.”

“As long as they get me a guitar, I’m good,” Niall inserts. “But I’m with Harry on this one.”

“They must have something,” Liam points out, “They’ve been planning this for months.”

“Yes, but how would they know to make instruments?” Louis argues.

“The internet, obviously,” Harry drawls, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, and Liam can feel Zayn’s giggles against his neck.

\---

It’s all easier, after that. It’s still messy, and there are a few pokes sometimes to make sure no one sings when Zayn should be, but it’s easier to get into something passable. Or maybe Liam just finds it easier to breathe, when he knows where he stands with Zayn. That they’re still Zayn-and-Liam.

Harry’s right about the band, as it turns out. The aliens aren’t half bad, either, with instruments scaled to their size that are a little off but still sound generally right. Liam’s not convinced they know anything other than One Direction songs—though the one on the guitar demonstrated a decent Baby that had Niall laughing as it hopped proudly up and down—but they’re enough, and it seems to be what the aliens are expecting.

“We can go home, after this, right?” Zayn asks the brown in-charge alien, after a meal of something Liam doesn’t even want to think about, but that they were assured was okay for humans to eat. (And that Zayn could eat it, as a red robed alien told him, or that’s what they assumed the _no pig no pig no pig_ chant meant). The other aliens seemed to be heading to the arena, but the brown one was leading them backstage. “You’ll send us home?”

“Home, yes.” The brown one nods. “Don’t forget where you belong.”

“And we belong on Earth,” Zayn tells it. “That’s where—like, my mum—”

Liam doesn’t hesitate, this time, to wrap a comforting arm around Zayn’s waist. The brown one turns its head to look at them, then nods in satisfaction. “Home, yes. Need home time.” It pats at Liam’s hand where it’s on Zayn. “We have traveled far too. A long way from home.”

“So you won’t be taking us back to your home?” Zayn presses. Liam’s hand tightens on him. He hadn’t even thought of that.

The brown one shakes its head, though one of the green ones, overhearing, chitters something at it. It replies to that sharply, then, “No. We know you need your family, and girlfriends, and pets. They are yours too.” It squeaks regretfully. “We thought about taking them too, but we did not know how to take all of England. And Ireland. And LA.”

“You thought about that?” Liam manages to ask.

The brown one nods, like it’s obvious. “Yes yes. But there were…space problems.”

“Right.” Zayn blinks, then shakes his head like he’s just not going to deal with that, and nods. “Yeah, like, good. If we’re going home.”

Home, right. Liam hadn’t even thought about home, about what would happen after. About how it would feel to go back to not having Zayn next to him, even if he knows Zayn is happy. To be back in that hotel room in Kansas.

Zayn’s hand slips into his, and he squeezes, like he knows what Liam’s thinking. The brown one pats their joined hands, then runs ahead to open a door that has a life sized picture of Lou and Caroline on it.

Inside is just as papered with their pictures as the rest of the ship, but it’s got hints of green in it too, and five mirrors with their names on each, and chairs in front of them. Liam looks at his, which seems to have been decorated with a Batman theme, and lets go of Zayn’s hand to go over to look at the rack of clothes next to his mirror. It’s got what looks like his full tour wardrobe on it, everything from now back to X Factor. “Sick!”

Louis’s laughing as he grabs a Doncaster Rovers jersey off his rack. “Even got my number right.”

“Don’t see how they couldn’t,” Niall adds absently, chuckling at the Irish flags peppered around his station.

“Why does mine come with scissors?” Zayn asks, holding up something that Liam supposes must be scissors. “Did you guys get scissors? Am I supposed to cut my hair?”

Harry leans over Zayn, pulls out the MTV sweatshirt, sleeves still on, that’s hanging on the rack. “Think it’s supposed to go with this one.”

“Bitch,” Louis throws in, and then they’re all laughing, and Zayn snatches the sweatshirt out of Harry’s hand to throw at Louis. Louis growls and takes off after him, dodging Harry and an alien, Zayn staying ahead by mere yards. He shoves a stool between them, then darts behind Liam.

“Move, Liam,” Louis orders, stalking closer. Zayn’s laughing behind him, and Liam crosses his arms over his chest.

“Nah.”

“Move,” Louis warns again, and lunges around him, Zayn swings around to the other side, keeping Liam directly between them.

“Come on, Payno, I just want to tackle him a bit,” Louis demands, and Zayn giggles as he wraps his arms around Liam’s waist, hooks his chin over Liam’s shoulder.

“Liam’ll always protect me, yeah?” he retorts. Liam swallows, tries to stand firm when Zayn’s pressed against him, when he can feel his chest against Liam’s back, their hips pressed together. Liam must have forgotten, or his willpower’s shrunk or something, because he used to be able to resist this, but now all he wants to do is spin around in Zayn’s arms and kiss the laughter from his mouth.

“That’s not fair. Niall, c’mere, they’re teaming up on me.”

“You surprised?” Niall asks. He’s looking at the guitar that was leaning at his station, playing with the fingering.

“Harold?”

“I only get hurt when I get involved,” Harry points out, pretty accurately. Zayn sticks his tongue out from over Liam’s shoulder. It’s been—god, how long had it been, since Liam had seen Zayn like this, before a show? On stage he was fine, always had been when he was doing the thing he loved most, but it had been sneaking away for cigarette breaks or chilling with Louis before a show for a year at least.

It’s that, somehow, that drives it in. That this was good for Zayn. That Zayn’s happy, now, like he hadn’t been for a while, even if he had been at first. That this is how things are fixed.

 “Traitors, all of you.” Louis huffs out a breath. “And you too, Malik. My own partner in crime.”

Liam can feel Zayn’s quick exhale, can see, so close, the curve of his smile. “Yeah?”

“Not when you betray me,” Louis retorts, but he’s smiling too. And there’s that, slotting back into place, “All of you. Even you, Liam. I know Zayn’s your favorite, but some band loyalty would be nice.”

“Oh, so it was band loyalty when you left me—” Niall starts, and Louis turns to argue with him.

Zayn doesn’t let go of Liam. “Am I?” he asks, softly enough it doesn’t carry. “Still your favorite?”

It’s easier, somehow, when he can’t really look at Zayn, when he’s still got Zayn’s arms on him. “Always,” Liam says, and it doesn’t feel like an admission, it feels like the truth.

Zayn’s arms disappear from around him, but then Zayn’s in front of him, his face serious even though he’s still got the remnants of his laughter in the corners of his eyes. “You’re mine, too,” he tells Liam, “That hasn’t changed.”

Liam can’t help his grin, the stupid endeared one he knows he gets whenever Zayn looks at him too long, the one Louis makes fun of sometimes. “Yeah? Are you a Liam girl? Should we get you one of the brown robes?”

“Always, babe,” Zayn laughs again, and he’s coming close and for a second Liam flashes back, thinks of that one time long ago before his crush was anything really, the ‘come on come on’ when he had taken a chance—then Zayn’s lips are brushing his cheek. “Right next to you, yeah?”

Liam only stops himself from shuddering because of long practice. “Yeah,” he agrees. He’ll make it still be true, even if Zayn’s happy far away. They can—Skype is a thing. He’ll call him. He’ll make it work. He knows how to be long distance friends; it’ll just take some adjusting.

Then he takes a step back, away from Zayn. “Okay, we’ve got to get ready,” he tells everyone, because Harry and Niall and Louis seem to have gotten distracted with the guitar-thing Niall’s been given. “Choose your outfits, everyone, then we’ll see what we can do for hair.”

“I can—”

“Touch my hair and die, Styles,” Niall warns, dancing away from Harry’s hands, and Liam watches them bicker as Zayn giggles as he paws through his rack of clothes and Louis’s making a face at his hair in the mirror.

\---

They have the original OTRA tour intro video, but Liam doesn’t have a chance to watch it. Instead, they’re all standing in a circle, their hands in. There are a few aliens lingering, watching them, but Liam assumes most of them are out in the arena, and Liam doesn’t really care who’s watching them right now. 

“So, last concert as a five piece, yeah?” Louis’s the one who says it. “Better make it a good one. Or else they might blow up the Earth.”

“Thanks for that,” Liam puts in.

“We could have a reunion tour,” Niall points out. “If Zayn’s not too busy selling places out on his own.”

“Niall,” Zayn mutters. “But yeah. Maybe someday.” Liam curves his fingers over Zayn’s hand to squeeze.

“Until then, though.” Harry glances around. He’s calm, smiling like he always is before a show, when Liam can see the adrenaline thrumming through him. “Heigh ho—”

“Heigh ho, it’s off to work we go!” They finish together, and run towards the stage opening and fog together.

\---

Liam keeps his eyes down, as he runs out. This time more than ever, he wants the shock of it, the fact that he’s playing for aliens, that this is the culmination of all these…thing’s dreams. So his eyes stay on a floor that looks basically the same, something that seems like wood and wires, and in a way it doesn’t feel differently from any other concert. There’s cheering, if a little off sounding, and music playing, and the adrenaline rush—

Then he looks up, and it’s not the same. There are thousands of them, more than Liam expected could fit, rows and rows and rows in their waves of colors, all of them screaming and chittering and it’s like every other concert a thousand times.

“Shit,” Niall swears, under his breath, as the Clouds intro starts. Liam nods, and glances over.

Zayn’s staring out at the crowd, his eyes as wide as any of the aliens’, or maybe that’s just his new hair. But his jaw’s dropped a little, and Liam edges over, wraps an arm around his waist.

“Good?” he murmurs. Zayn glances up, smiles, his eyes crinkling, and Liam can’t help but smile back.

“Yeah, just. Forgot.” Zayn gestures around him. Harry’s started to sing; Liam should pay attention to that. But it’s hard, when Zayn’s next to him on stage again. “Forgot how big it was.”

“This is bigger than anything we’ve done before,” Liam points out, and when Zayn laughs he just shrugs and together they lift their microphones to add to the harmonies.

Liam had forgotten too. Had forgotten how different they sound with Zayn, how Zayn’s voice reaches up and around theirs, filling them out. It’s like things are slotting into place, as Liam finishes his verse and then Zayn’s is next, and there’s a roar from the crowd as the aliens start jumping up and down.

But it’s weird, too. How different they sound. How when Liam says to the crowd, when Clouds is done and the cheering’s died down, “We are One Direction!” he can see Zayn laughing with Niall, and it’s—it’s just different. Maybe not even better, he thinks, settling into Steal my Girl. Just different, because Zayn is here, but also because there are aliens in the band and when he looks out into the crowd instead of signs there are some weird lights shining.

But it’s still a show, and there’s nothing Liam loves more than this, than being on stage with his four best friends, so he throws himself into it. He grabs at Harry’s nipples during his solo, plays with Niall as Harry talks, lets Louis chase him around stage. And then there’s Zayn, and how Liam can’t help orbiting around him, dancing to make him laugh and grinning at each of his solos. How Liam can’t look away from him, from how he shines on stage, as he announces Little Things with what was his usual speech.

“Hey.” Zayn gestures to Liam from across the platform, as Harry croons out Little Things. And that’s like it was too, stretching out over the platform to reach to Zayn, Zayn meeting him halfway, whispering at each other close enough Liam can’t ever quite look away from his lips. “Think those alien lights are asking us to fuck them too?”

Liam shivers, because there’s a love song in the background and Zayn’s so close and he’s smiling and joking like he’s happy, like he’s happy here with Liam. But he’d always been happy on stage, Liam knows. It was only off stage it was bad, but here—here’s where Zayn belongs. “How’d that work, though?” he asks, and Zayn smiles, slow and dirty.

They don’t have time to say more, before Zayn has to sing, and maybe it’s the lights, or maybe it’s Liam remembering, or maybe it’s something else, but Liam swears there are stars in his eyes as he does.

Louis saunters up to him after, when Zayn off whispering to Harry. “You’re lucky real fans aren’t out there,” he mutters, grabbing at Liam’s nipple. Liam grabs his hand before he gets there, laughing.

“Think they’re pretty real. And why?”

“Because your face isn’t hiding anything, bro,” Louis retorts, and goes for his other nipple with his other hand. Liam catches that too. “Just saying. If these gifs were going on tumblr…”

“Nothing they haven’t seen before,” Liam retorts. “And…” he trails off, because this is what he’s been trying not to think about. “It’s our last time, isn’t it? I’m making memories.”

Louis huffs out a breath, but it’s amused. “You’re such a cheeseball,” he teases, and head-butts Liam before he runs back off.

The concert goes by in a blur, mainly of concentrating on not taking any of Zayn’s parts or doing new choreo and trying not to remember that there are aliens out there and they’re not actually sure they understand many of their speeches but they seem to love them anyway, laughing at Harry’s bad jokes and Louis’s quips and Niall’s one-liners. Nothing’s thrown on stage at least, which Harry looks a little disappointed at, but Liam had been a bit worried about what might end up there so he’s glad.

Then it’s You and I. Liam had been okay, through most of the concert; had shifted easily back into concert mode, where nothing else mattered. But You and I—it’s been the hardest, recently, without Zayn, because it was—it had been hard, to learn how to sing it not to Zayn. To not look at Zayn and pretend he didn’t mean it.

But Niall starts to sing, and Liam doesn’t have to look to know where Zayn is when it’s his part, just looks across the stage to sing. At this boy who he’s never known not to be in love with, fights and holding each other tight and everything. And Zayn’s looking back, their eyes meeting, and Liam sings it to him on stage for the last time, probably, and his voice doesn’t falter.

Harry picks up his solo, and then—then Zayn raises his microphone, and his voice is there, heartbreaking as always, and there’s no world for Liam but Zayn, if there ever was; no world for him but Zayn singing and pacing across the stage towards him, until he’s there, next to Liam, like he promised he always would be. Liam’s harmonizing, he knows he is, but it’s on autopilot. He can’t think, can’t see anything but Zayn, who leans into Liam’s side, his arm around his waist, as he finishes, smiling at Liam.

It takes all of Harry’s solo for Liam to get his breath back, then he almost loses it again because Zayn’s high note is rising above their voices, and he knows they’ve done a good job making up for Zayn not being there, that they’ve made the song work without him, but there’s nothing like Zayn’s voice there, and Liam turns again to Zayn, whose head is tipped back, the veins visible in his neck. “We could make it if we try,” he sings, and doesn’t pretend he doesn’t mean it.

“Um.” Niall nudges Liam’s elbow, as Zayn’s note trails off. “Not to break your love song with Zayn, but—look.”

Liam looks, and his breath catches. They’re alight, all of the aliens, glowing all different shades of silver, so it looks like they’re just a sea of it, a silent metal sea.

“I think they liked that,” Louis says, and even he sounds impressed.

“Yeah,” Zayn breathes, awestruck. “Fuck. Aliens.”

Liam nods. The shining isn’t stopping, so he turns around—the band isn’t shining, they seem too wrapped up in their playing, so he nods to them and it goes on to the next song.

The aliens glow for the rest of the concert, until Zayn’s singing the end of the show, all of them looking out at the silver cut only by the colors of their robes. “It was the best song ever,” Zayn sings, and Liam watches the silver pulse, then he turns—and Zayn’s not looking at the aliens, he’s looking back, at the four of them, his gaze bright and his smile soft. “It was—” and for a second, his voice breaks, before he swallows and continues. “It was the best song ever…” his voice fades out, until there’s just silence and the moonlight glow of the aliens all around them.

Liam can’t speak, but he reaches out, grabs Zayn to pull him into him, then Niall hits him on the other side and Louis grabs them all and Harry’s stretched around all of them, so they’re wrapped together. Liam’s arms are crushed around Zayn, and he can feel Zayn smiling into his shoulder, even as the other boys crush them all closer.

“You’re such a sap,” Liam says, and the other boys probably hear it but he doesn’t care.

“Says the person hugging me like I’m gonna break,” Zayn retorts, “It was, though. If I haven’t said that yet.”

“You’re both cheesy as fuck,” Louis tells them. He gives one final hug, then wiggles away so Harry has to let go as well. That seems to bring him back, and Harry turns to the aliens as Niall detaches, as Liam lets go of Zayn. He doesn’t go far, though, keeps an arm around Liam’s waist.

“Thank you!” Harry announces, his voice deep and slow. “We were One—”

And that’s when the guns go off.

\---

For a second, it’s silent. Harry’d stopped talking, confused about the massive bang that had just shaken the stage; the aliens all seem frozen, some of them still glowing. Liam doesn’t know exactly when he’d grabbed Zayn or if he ever let go of him, but his hand’s on Zayn’s hip and Zayn’s is on his, resting comfortingly.

Then it all erupts into chaos, all the aliens leap out of their seats, and they’re scrambling out of the stadium. A blue robed alien jumps onto the stage where the podium used to be, starts chittering something in its language out to the aliens; suddenly Steal My Girl is playing everywhere, Zayn’s voice thundering out loud enough that even he jumps.

“What’s happening?” Liam demands, turning to the band—but their instruments have been set down and they’re gone too.

Louis grabs the blue one by the arm. “What’s going on?” he demands. The alien’s eyes widen, and it looks at Louis’s hand on it. Its mouth opens and closes a few times, soundless.

Louis rolls his eyes, but he lets go, holds his hands up to show they’re empty. “What’s going on,” he repeats.

“The _chitter chitter_ are—attack!” it tells them, bouncing on its feet. The room’s almost empty but now. “We must defend. Call to arms song!”

Harry tilts his head. “This is your fight song?” he asks thoughtfully. “It’s a little happy.”

“We’re being attacked?” Zayn ignores Harry to ask. “Who?”

“They followed!” It hops. “Stations, stations.” It pats at Louis’s leg, then turns to the nearest alien, a yellow one, and chitters at it. The yellow one nods, then the blue one’s gone, and the yellow one grabs Niall’s pants leg to tug at him.

“What?” Niall asks, but he goes, and the rest of them follow. “Where are we going?”

It’s face twists, and it trips, but it rolls a little and keeps going. It’s hard to follow in the sea of aliens running through the halls, hard to hear over the music, but the aliens part ways for them. “Watch!” it declares. “One Direction, watch!”

“Okay but where—” Zayn starts, then the brown one appears out of nowhere, and the yellow one gives a grateful chirp.

“Come come,” it says, and grabs at Liam’s arm to pull him along.  “Stupid” chitter chitter “Wanted attack. Followed us, think to stop us from getting wifi. But they do not know about you. You will see! We are made of lightning!”

“Of course it’s the Wanted,” Louis mutters. They’re pulled back through the corridors, over crowds of aliens surging every which way, until they reach what Liam can only assume is the cockpit. Or, the bridge, like in Firefly. It’s got what looks like the pilot though, and five aliens in black robes who give them a single glance before they’re staring back at screens that cover one wall. There’s a whole area in front of the pilot that’s just—Liam doesn’t know if it’s glass or not, but it’s see through, and for the first time, he looks out at space.

“Holy fucking shit,” Zayn swears, next to him, and Liam hums out a nod. It’s everything it’s supposed to be, the utter blackness, but he doesn’t see earth, doesn’t know how far away they are. Zayn must come to the same realization, because his hand tightens on Liam’s wrist. But Liam’s a little distracted by the fact that now he can see how their ship curves in a disc like the Millennium Falcon, and there’s every UFO’s saucer coming down at them, things that are probably lasers or phaser beams or _something_ slicing through the dark of space only to dissolve at what Liam guesses is a force field.

“Holy shit we’re going to die,” Louis mutters.

“Louis!” Harry chides, but his eyes are huge too, and his shoulders are curving inwards. “Um, maybe we’ll win?”

“Victory will be ours!” One of the black robed ones announces. “Change to Girl Almighty!”

Suddenly the music switches, and Liam’s voice is there, and the ship starts firing to—yeah, they’re actually firing to the beat of the music. Those beams, in a medley of red, blue, yellow, green, and brown, flash out, but hit a force field too, and the pilot drops their nose so they go downwards, Harry stumbling until Zayn grabs him to steady him. Zayn doesn’t look too steady on his feet either, so Liam wraps an arm around his shoulders.

“It’ll be—” he starts, but Zayn shakes his head.

“Don’t. We don’t—we’re on an alien ship and getting attacked, I’ve seen the movies. Don’t finish that sentence.”

Liam shrugs, and doesn’t. But he hugs Zayn close, and Zayn’s arm wraps around his waist to hold him just as close.

“If we die here, do you think anyone will know what happened?” Niall asks, suddenly, and Liam winces.

“We’re not going to die. They’re going to win.”

“Yeah!” Harry agrees staunchly. “We’re made of lightning!”

“Lightning!” the aliens all chorus.

“You and I,” a black one declares, and the speed of shooting changes. That seems slow, and Liam considers pointing that out, but before he can, another one yells, “Act My Age!” and the shooting speeds up. It’s still all hitting the force field, and the other ship’s hitting theirs, but the aliens are chittering like it’s a good thing.

Zayn’s hand tightens suddenly around Liam’s waist, and Liam glances over. Zayn’s looking at him, and it’s not fear in his gaze, not like the first time they were on a plane, though Liam wouldn’t blame him if it were, because he’s not sure this ship won’t do loop-da-loops.

“No Control!”

“We’ll be okay,” Liam tells Zayn, even though yeah, he knows it might be tempting fate. But he thinks they both need to hear it.

Zayn tilts his head, but there’s that look in his gaze still, something Liam almost recognizes. “Yeah,” he agrees, “Yeah, we fucking will. Liam—”

The ship shudders, and the aliens all start chittering.

“Fool’s Gold!” One of the black one snaps, but there’s another shuddering hit. The other ship looks like its force field is going too, but Liam doesn’t know what’s going faster, and fuck, if they die here—

There’s a flash of orange light, and Liam actually sees it hit the ship. The chittering picks up, and it’s instinct when they boys all step closer together. It won’t do anything against this, Liam knows, but it’s never failed them before, really.

Suddenly, a black one whirls and chitters something at the brown in charge one, who nods, then darts over to them. “Safe!”

“What?”

“One Direction must be safe!” it tells them, and pulls on Niall’s leg. “Come! Home. Can’t risk you.”

“But—”

“Come!” it says, and Niall shrugs at Liam, then follows it. The halls are empty this time—maybe they’re all at battle stations—so they’re moving quickly, almost jogging despite its shorter legs. The songs are still switching rapidly over the loudspeakers, and the ship shakes a few times. Zayn’s hand is tight on Liam’s arm, but he can’t think about that now. They need to get home. 

Then they’re in a room that looks like something right out of Star Trek, a platform and a control panel. There’s five spots on the platform, a red, yellow, blue, green, and brown one, and they’re herded onto the one of what’s apparently they’re color..

“So, we’re just going? Just like that?” Niall asks, and the yellow one nods.

“Yes yes! Back where you belong.”

“But I—” Zayn turns to them, his gaze wide and a little panicked. “Back to where we were, or—”

The ship shakes again; the music switches to back Girl Almighty.

“Go now!” The brown one snaps, at the people at the control. It turns to them, and four others have appeared from somewhere, one for each of them. “One Direction!” they say in unison, giving thumbs up. “We love you!”

“But I wanted—” Zayn starts, then there’s light, all around them, silver and the aliens are blurring and Liam can’t help turning to Zayn, because that’s what he does, and Zayn’s looking at him, his lips are moving, and Liam can see his lips forming his name, then there’s nothing but black.

\---

Liam wakes up alone, and he knows immediately that he’s back on Earth. The air feels different, and the blankets beneath him are rough in the right ways, and he can hear traffic outside. He opens his eyes—and yes, he’s back, back in the Kansas hotel room he’d gone to sleep in…a little over 24 hours ago, according to his phone. Or did he? It almost seems like a dream, because there can’t really have been aliens. And Zayn was there, he’d been on stage with Zayn again, so it had to be a dream.

There’s a pounding on the door. “Liam!” Louis’s yelling. “Liam, you better fucking be there, open your door!”

Liam rolls out of bed, pulls open the door so Louis almost falls in. He gives Liam one long look, then grabs him into a quick hug. “Good, you’re back safe.”

“Back? So it wasn’t a dream?”

“Not unless you went to sleep in those clothes,” Louis points out, nodding to the pseudo-jeans and white t-shirt Liam had on. “Aliens, right?”

“Yeah.” Okay, not a dream. Aliens. “Are—”

“We’re back!” Niall announces, stepping into the room. “Looks like we went back to where they took us from.”

“I wonder if they’re okay,” Harry adds, coming in too and sitting on Liam’s bed. “I hope they won. Or are winning.”

“Of course they are,” Louis tells him dismissively. It’s not worth pointing out that he was singing a very different tune on that ship. “They’re our fans, they’re not going to lose. Everyone have all their limbs?”

Niall holds out his fingers to count; Louis grimaces at him.

Liam takes a deep breathe. They’re all there, they’re fine, they’re back, but—

“Think Zayn’s okay?” he asks. Niall’s brow furrows, and he opens his mouth. As if on cue, all of their phones buzz.

Liam pulls his out. There’s a message on their group text, a chain that’s been blank since mid-March. Liam glances quickly past the last one, the angry cursing from Louis, to Zayn’s _back okay, you all? xx_

_We’re good! x_ comes from Harry’s phone. Zayn sends back a row of alien and kissy face emojis.

“Control your face, Payne,” Louis snaps, and Liam pulls his face out of his sappy grin at a message.

“Shut up,” he tells him, and he knows he’s still smiling. “We should go find someone, right?”

“Think about what this is going to do for our sales,” Harry muses, slipping his phone back into his pocket and leaning back. “Think anyone will believe us?”

“No.” Niall shakes his head. “Maybe—think we should tell people? I feel like they’ll think we’re on drugs or something.”

“Not you,” Louis retorts. “But yeah. We’ll have to coordinate with Zayn, see what PR thinks. Wonder how they spun it?”

They’re all still talking, but Liam looks at his phone, at that line of emojis. Zayn had wanted to say something, had looked desperate to. To say something to him.

He moves to just text Zayn, without the other boys. _Wht were u gnnnna say?_  

“Can we take a second, though?” Niall says, and Liam looks up. Harry’s gotten up; apparently they’re ready to go. “First band to play an intergalactic concert!”

“One for the record books,” Louis agrees. “Is it intergalactic if we were close to Earth, though?”

“First to play a concert in space!” Niall amends. “How sick’s that?”

“Pity no one will believe us,” Harry points out, and Niall’s face falls. Liam glances at his phone. Zayn hasn’t texted back.

\---

He doesn’t text back when they find their team, as the full weight of their confusion and disapproval falls on them. He doesn’t text back during the whirlwind of interview and statement and management’s incredulous disbelief and insistence they must have been brainwashed that breaks on their own insistence they weren’t. He doesn’t text back as Liam falls back into bed, exhausted by a day of being told he’s insane and wondering.

It’s not like Liam’s surprised—it’s Zayn, and he’s probably doing his own damage control, with his family if no one else. But it feels weird again, not having Zayn next to him, after a day of having him back. Feels weird that he’s not here with them. That Liam doesn’t have him and his quiet, steady backup, his unrelenting surety that Liam’s right. He could text him again, Liam knows, and it wouldn’t be the first time he blew up Zayn’s phone when Zayn wasn’t texting back, but he’s not sure they’re there yet. Maybe, now they’re back…Zayn’s probably curled up with his pets, sleeping it off. Or maybe he’s with his family, letting his mum coddle him. He can fix himself, he doesn’t need Liam, or if he did, he’d ask. And if he wanted him…well, he could ask for that too.

\---

It’s a good dream, Liam’s having. A pretty boring one, not one he’d be inclined to share with everyone, but a good dream. He’s in his bed, and he’s sleeping, and there’s a weight on his chest and breath against his neck he knows, his arm wrapped around a waist that he doesn’t have to open his eyes to recognize. It’s a nice dream, quiet and warm and easy, just lying there sleeping knowing Zayn’s there with him.

Liam inhales, and there’s the cologne Zayn always wears, a bit of sweat and the stale scent that comes from airplanes. Zayn shifts against him, mumbling something into his neck, and Liam pulls him closer. “Go back to sleep,” he whispers. Liam doesn’t want to wake up from this dream, not yet. “Little more.”

“Li?” Zayn’s voice is close, hoarse like it is when he’s just woken up. “You awake?”

“No.” Liam tilts his head down so he can nuzzle into Zayn’s hair. “Sleep.”

“Come on, babe. Wake up.” That makes Liam make a face. His dream Zayn could at least be accurate. “I know you’re up, Liam.” Zayn draws out his name, enough to make Liam smile, like it always does. “I’m never awake before you, you’ve got to be up.”

“Don’t think it works that way.” Liam opens his eyes, though. Zayn’s still there, his chin propped on Liam’s chest, looking up at him. Liam thinks he should be surprised, but compared to aliens, having Zayn in his bed when he wakes up is pretty normal. Breathtaking, because Zayn is always breathtaking, with morning light catching in his eyelashes and his whole face sleep-soft, but not surprising. “What’re you doing here?”

“Hi to you too.” Zayn gives a quick smile, but it’s nervous, and he sits up, drawing away from Liam. Liam grabs onto him mainly unthinkingly, but once his hand’s on Zayn’s knee, he doesn’t really find the need to move it.

“Hi, Zayn, nice to see you,” Liam repeats obediently. “What’re you doing here?”

“You’re the most comfortable to sleep on,” Zayn explains. His gaze darts away from Liam’s, and it’s a poor attempt at evasion anyway, even if it makes Liam’s stomach flutter.

“How’d you get in?” It’s not the question Liam should ask, he knows, but Zayn’s licking at his lips, and he never wants to be the person who puts that expression on Zayn’s face, so he goes for something else. “To my room.”

Zayn snorts. “Think Paddy was going to keep me out?”

It’s fair. No one knows how Liam feels about Zayn more than Paddy. He’s gotten far too many drunk monologues, has stopped Liam from drunk texting Zayn too many times, not to.  Of course he’s going to let Zayn in.

“But that’s not—” Zayn shakes his head, runs a hand over his ear, fiddling with his earring. It’s such a Zayn motion, Liam has to smile. “Like, I wanted—I wanted to check up on all of you.”

“Right, sure,” Liam agrees. If his heart falls a little, that’s okay. He knows Zayn would want to check up on all of them, because he’s always been a worrier, and phones have never been enough for him. He needs to touch people, to make sure they’re okay. Liam’s been alternately tortured and thrilled by that tendency in the past. “We’re all in one piece, though. Nothing left behind.”

“I can see that,” Zayn agrees, his gaze trailing down Liam’s bare chest for a second before he goes back to his sheets. Liam shifts, scoots up on the bed so he can sit up too. “No, but, like. That’s not—I mean, I—” He shakes his head again. “I wanted to say something, up on the ship, but then the aliens were attacking and we were getting beamed down.”

“The  aliens were attacking,” Liam repeats. “You realize we’re talking about aliens attacking like it’s just a thing?”

“Sick, right? At least from down here.” Zayn’s grin flashes, wide and bright, and Liam’s stomach flips again. “But I…” his fingers drum on his thigh, and Liam reaches out, grabs them to still them. “I had something to say, up there, and I didn’t get a chance, and you should hear it, yeah?” He glances up at Liam, a quick, tentative look through his eyelashes. “But I didn’t want to say it in front of everyone, not even the boys. And not over the phone.”

“You ever going to say it?” Liam teases. But his heart’s going too fast. What more is there to say? They hashed it out, and they’re back on even ground, back to where they were. More or less. They’ll get there, anyway, and it can go back to the new normal, to Zayn across the world but a text away. To Zayn still being Liam’s favorite, and Liam still being in love with him but he thinks he’s got a handle on it again, without the guilt eating him up. Zayn’s happy, Liam’s—well, he’s as happy as he can be. “Or am I going to have to drag it out of you.”

“Shut up.” Zayn sticks his tongue out. “I, like. I don’t know how to say it. Just…” He blinks, and Liam gets so caught in the feathering of his eyelashes over his cheeks that he doesn’t really register Zayn’s coming closer until he’s right there, on his knees in front of Liam, close enough that Liam can see the freckle in his eye, could count the infinity of his eyelashes, can see the moisture on Zayn’s lips from where he’s been licking. One of Zayn’s hands curls around Liam’s neck, tilting his head, and Liam’s been here once before but he never even considered he’d be here again. “Yeah?” Zayn asks, his eyes dropping to Liam’s lips. 

Liam’s not entirely sure what’s happening, but a week ago he had never thought he would ever get Zayn this close again, and he’s never been able to say no to Zayn even when he wanted to. “Come on, then,” he breathes, and Zayn’s lips curve, so he must know what Liam’s repeating. “Come on.”

Zayn kisses him soft and sweet, his lips barely brushing against Liam’s. Liam’s dreamed about this moment, even if he never thought it would happen. Dreamed, and tried not to, and now it’s happening.

Except Zayn pulls away, enough that he can look into Liam’s eyes, his brow furrowing. “Yeah?”

Liam swallows. “Um.” He’s fairly certain his brain’s not working. He’s probably still dreaming. Still up on that ship.

Zayn’s face shutters shut, and he shifts back on his heels, his hand sliding off of Liam’s neck. “You don’t have to, I just thought maybe it was worth trying—like, if you don’t, that’s cool, but on the ship I realized, and I—”

 “I’ve been in love with you since we were eighteen,” Liam blurts out. Zayn’s mouth drops. Liam probably could have said that better, but now it’s out there, and it’s a relief, after keeping it in so long. “Or at least three quarters in love, I tried not to be that last quarter, but then—you left, and I couldn’t stop thinking about why, and maybe that was the last quarter, I don’t know. But you kissed me, so you should know.”

“Eighteen?” Zayn repeats. His voice is hoarse.  “That’s—that’s years, Li.”

“Yeah, noticed.” Liam doesn’t want to look at Zayn. He knows there won’t be disgust there, not ever; it’s Zayn, and he’s never been disgusted with Liam, never been impatient with him. But he doesn’t want to see him back away. Not now that Liam remembers what it feels like to kiss him, and he ruined everything because if he’d just kept quiet maybe Zayn would have kept kissing him. “You don’t have to feel it back. I know you love me, we’re mates, that’s enough, it always has been. But it didn’t feel fair, for you to kiss me, not knowing.” He picks at a thread in the blankets, teasing it out.

“You donut.” Zayn hand is on Liam’s neck again, forcing his head up, and somehow Zayn’s in his lap properly, straddling his thighs, so Liam doesn’t have a choice but to steady him with his hands on Zayn’s hips. He closes his eyes. He doesn’t want to look, to see the kindness in Zayn’s gaze, the easy let down that he’s been avoiding for three years. “You absolute idiot.” There are lips on Liam’s forehead, then his cheekbone, and then his lips, another one of those feather-light brushes. “You’ve been holding that in for years?”

“Didn’t want to fuck anything up,” Liam mutters. Zayn’s probably just comforting him. He’s the one who couldn’t help Zayn, couldn’t keep him. “You had Perrie, and you were happy, and I had Soph and it was good.”

“Babe.” Zayn’s lips brush his again. “Babe, open your eyes, come on.” Liam has to open his eyes, at that, can’t say no to him, and Zayn’s smiling down at him, soft and a little shy, but not uncertain. Never uncertain, not Zayn. “Think I go around kissing all the boys?”

“Yeah, you do,” Liam points out. He doesn’t know what’s happening. Aliens, he could handle. Zayn in his lap smiling at him like Liam’s the best thing in the world, he doesn’t know what to do with. “You kiss the boys all the time, and—”

He’s cut off by Zayn’s lips on his again, harder this time, more of a statement. “Think I kiss all the boys like that?” Zayn amends. “There’s nothing to fuck up, now. Just us.”

Liam blinks. “Have you—”

Zayn licks his lip at that, shakes his head. “Not since—like, whenever. Or maybe? I dunno. I just know that I was thinking, on that ship, when they were attacking, how much it would’ve gutted me if I hadn’t been with you lads, if I’d been on earth freaking out. And then you were there, being so you, and, like, I dunno. Clicked into place, didn’t it? It’s always been you.” Zayn smiles, and Liam could trace the lines at the corners of his eyes. “Right next to you, yeah? Always.”

“You left, though.” Liam can’t help but say it. He still can’t believe this is happening, that Zayn’s here. He must be dreaming.

“And aliens brought me back.” Zayn rolls his eyes, as Liam can’t help but snort out a laugh.

“Can’t count on that always happening, though.”

“Do you want this, Liam?” Zayn asks. He sounds casual, but his fingers are digging into Liam’s skin, and Liam’s spent years learning all his tells, how to see when he’s nervous so he can stop it. “I know things have changed, and if you don’t, that’s—it’s fine, yeah? We’re still friends, always. But I just thought—like, we could try? It won’t be easy, it’ll be all the shit with long distance and the band, but, like…” Zayn trails off, shrugs. “I had to say it.”

“’Course I want this, don’t you be a donut,” Liam retorts, more on instinct. Zayn is nervous, Zayn needs to be reassured. That’s easy. “Just don’t see why you would.”

“Don’t start that,” Zayn warns, and pokes at his stomach. “I might not have been in love with you since we were kids, but I know what you’re worth, babe.”

Liam can’t help his grin, the blush he knows is rising too his cheeks, like it does whenever Zayn compliments him like that. But he has to say this, because he’s a worrier, he is, and he can’t help it. “Not that, though. If it gets out—you’ll be back, in the public eye and everything you needed to get away from.”

“I thought about that,” Zayn admits. But he doesn’t look away from Liam. Liam’s envied that for so long, the way Zayn never seems to worry about his choices, about what he wants. How he’s so certain in his skin. “But it won’t be like before, not all the time. And you’re worth it.”

“Even though—”

“You’re worth it,” Zayn repeats, and no one’s ever made Liam feel like that’s true like Zayn, whether they were seventeen and curled up together in the bungalow, Liam overwhelmed by all the loud boys around him, or whether they were twenty and Zayn was pulling his phone away from him and tell him to fuck all of them, he looked great, or now, when he’s twenty-two and still reeling from fucking aliens and now Zayn. “You’ve got an entire tribe of aliens up there worshipping you. Think I’m allowed to down here.”

Liam looks up at Zayn, feels him shift under Liam’s hand, but he’s so sure. Sure Liam’s worth it, sure Liam didn’t mess everything up, that he didn’t fail. That he won’t fail Zayn. That he’ll take care of him, just like Zayn takes care of Liam, like they have since they were eighteen.

“Worship?” Liam teases. His heart feels like it’s going to beat out of his body. “That what you’re going to do?”

Zayn grins, his whole body curling into it, his eyes crinkling into crescents and his nose scrunching up and Liam, as always, wants to kiss that smile, wants to put it on Zayn’s face and never let it leave.

“I’ll show you what I’m going to do to you,” he retorts, and leans down to kiss Liam again.

Liam gets his hands on Zayn this time, his fingers twining in his hair to keep him there, and it’s everything Liam’s ever dreamed about, Zayn’s lips against his, the taste of his mouth. How his body feels when Liam runs his hand up his side, tracing the lines of him. “Fuck, Li,” Zayn mutters, pulling away from Liam’s lips to kiss down his neck, nipping at his birthmark. “Can’t believe I never thought of this before.”

The thought occurs to Liam in a sudden, painful flash, and he tugs at Zayn’s hair until he’s looking at Liam again. He looks well on his way to wrecked, his lips swollen, his hair messy, his cheeks flushed, and Liam’s seen him like this before, but never because of him. He squashes down the flush of pride that gives him, because, “This isn’t—you don’t think it’s because of the aliens? They didn’t brainwash you or inject you or anything?”

Zayn snorts, and grinds down on Liam so Liam’s breath catches. “No, babe. Aliens didn’t make me do it.” He tilts his head, considering, and he’s got a smile on like he does after a particularly good prank. “Though I bet some of them would be pretty pleased. Think we can send them a message?”

“Maybe we’ll have to go back for an interview,” Liam replies, and Zayn shakes his head firmly.

“No. No more space travel. Don’t want to know I’m not on Earth ever again.”

“Don’t worry,” Liam tells him, and it feels more serious than it should be, in this Kansas hotel with the morning sun still rising outside. “I’ve got you. Even if we’re abducted by aliens.”

“I know.” Zayn nods, his fingers tracing one of the arrows on Liam’s arm. “Always have, haven’t you? Even when you’re mad.”

“Always,” Liam says again, and it’s a promise, to this boy who’s always made him feel like his promise is something worth having. “Now c’mere.” He rolls them over, so Zayn’s back hits the bed with a thump and a whoosh of Zayn’s breath, and Liam can prop himself up over Zayn. “Let me show you.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Liked it? Questions? Want to discuss? Comment or come chat on [ tumblr!](http://ridiculouslittleidiots.tumblr.com/)


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